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Sunday, 10 February 2013

Film Review: Looper

About the film

Looper is a 2012 science fiction/
action film. The film has a rating of 15 due to language, violence, some
sexuality and drug use. Looper has a run time of 119 minutes.

Plot

Set in the year 2044, time travel
has not yet been invented. However, in 2074 it has. Time travel is illegal and
only available on the black market. It’s hard to kill someone and be rid of the
evidence in 2074 so when the mob wants rid of someone, they send them back to
2044 where people called ‘Loopers’ are ready and waiting to shoot. They’re paid
in silver, strapped to the hooded body waiting to be killed.

Looper Joe loves his life. He has
plenty of money and lives exactly how he wants to. When his future self is sent
to him to be killed, he hesitates, giving future Joe enough time to escape. All
targets must be killed and both Joe and his future self end up running for
their lives, both of them wanting different outcomes.

What I thought

Although
Looper is a film about time travel, the majority of the film is set in the past
(2044). Something I really loved about this film was that the time in which it
was set, was not too far ahead of where we are now. The futuristic world is not
a million miles away from what we have now and instead of being a world
unrecognisable, it pretty much just has some amped up technology and ways of
enjoying yourself. The time travel aspect of the film, while a focal point of
the plot, kind of takes a back seat. Unlike other time travel films, this one
doesn’t spend ages explaining how time travel works, why it works or anything
else like it. Looper pretty much says time travel exists and that’s it! It was
refreshing to not have to sit through a long and drawn out explanation.

Protagonist
Joe is a Looper, a man hired to kill people from the future with no questions
asked. His targets are sent to him in a field, covered up from head to toe and
a whole load of silver strapped to their backs. Joe is played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt who, I have to say has gotten
pretty old looking compared to his days in films like 10 Things I Hate About
You. I barely recognised him and would have had to look up who he was if I didn’t
already know he was in the film. As Joe, he’s a pretty arrogant and full of
himself kind of guy, knowing what he has in life is pretty damn good. He plays
and parties hard, knowing he has a stash of silver which will cover anything he
needs. Joe was a hard character to like to begin with because he was such an
ass. However, things begin to chance when he is faced with killing his future
self.

Joe from the future is played by
Bruce Willis, who is in his element in this kind of film. We all know Willis is
a great actor in action films and this one is no exception. Future Joe is
completely different to regular Joe, due to having so much more life experience
and knowing how the world really works. I really liked seeing the contrast
between two characters who were actually the same. Future Joe, although still a
hard ass, has reasons for changing his life, which Joe just cannot begin to
understand, not having lived it for himself yet. My boyfriend and I also
thought it would be pretty cool to know you’d turn into Bruce Willis when you
grow up – it could be worse, couldn’t it?!

As well as the chase between regular
and future Joe, there was a pretty strange twist which I wasn’t expecting.
Telekinesis plays a large part in this film and future Joe knows that there
will be one person who could change everything later on in life. Future Joe’s
goal is to stop this person from becoming what he is in the future although
there’s a slight problem. It could be one of three and all three are children
during 2044. Although the whole telekinesis thing was quite strange, I liked
the twist that it brought into the film. It also made the film about so much
more than the two Joes.

Two other fantastic characters in
Looper are Sara and Cid, played by Emily Blunt and Pierce Gagnon. Sara and Cid
live on a farm way out in the middle of nowhere but regular Joe happens across
them while on the run. Sara is immediately protective of her and her son, not
wanting Joe to have anything to do them. The addition of these two characters
bring in that something extra that this film needed to set it aside from other
science fiction or action films. They add a bit of normality to the world
created, as their life revolves around living on a farm. Sara and Cid also make
it so that the scenery throughout the film isn’t always set in the futuristic
city.

While Looper was slightly
confusing at times, it was extremely enjoyable. There are some great plot
twists, a fantastic dialogue and the action scenes you would expect from Bruce
Willis. This one will be getting a place in my DVD collection!